The rapper, who dropped a group album (Too Hot for TV) with Da Band on Bad Boy in 2003, was driving through Michigan on his way to a show when he got lost after his phone battery died and his GPS app failed. Chopper then noticed that a car was following him and pulled the Lamborghini he was driving into a gas station to try to shake his tail.

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“He acted like he was walkin’ past me … and I seen him reach for a strap,” Chopper told MTV News from his hotel room in Chicago. “He started shootin’ at me, and he shot inside my Lamborghini, and he hit me on my side.

“He looked at my jewelry, but I gave him that look like, ’You gonna have to kill me if you want this,’ ” the rapper continued.

The shooter let off as many as four shots, Chopper estimated; he was hit once in his left leg. The gunman fled empty-handed, and the rapper was taken to the hospital, where he was able to charge his phone and call his entourage. As of now, no arrests have been made.

“You shot me for nothing; I didn’t do nothing to you, dog,” he said. “I just a young dude trying to do my thing. I just felt like that was an unnecessary crime.”

Since “Making the Band 2″ went off the air in 2004, Chopper City has been grinding independently, releasing mixtapes and touring without the aid of a major label. His most recent mixtape, Zoovie with DJ Gunpay, was released last summer, and Chopper plans to drop his next tape, Hard to Kill, on his 26th birthday January 22.

“I came up with it while I was in the hospital,” Chopper said of Hard to Kill. “They tried to kill, you ain’t just gonna kill me like that. I ain’t goin’ out like that.”